1、专业英语八级模拟试卷 361及答案与解析 0 Benjie Goodhart is in his late 30s, adores his partner and has a young son. But the thought of marriage has paralyzed him with fear. And its all thanks to his parents perfect marriage. Benjie Goodheart felt the pressure of wanting an idealized version of his parents relationsh
2、ip. According to Christine Northam, a relationship counselor with Relate. “Its like having a terribly clever elder brother at schoolit sets a competitive standard,“ she says. “Its a normal anxiety about a big change, and youve got the added pressure of wanting an idealized version of your parents re
3、lationship. “ It seems such anxiety is not uncommon. “As much as its hard to cope with parents being imperfect, cheating, splitting,“ says therapist Tracey Cox, “it is sometimes harder to be presented with the ideal happy marriage. “ Avy Joseph is a cognitive behavioral therapist and founder of City
4、Minds. “Its quite common for people to put pressure on themselves,“ he says, “if theyve grown up in an environment where, in their view, things have been perfect. “ Overcoming these fears involves accepting your marriage may not be perfect, but if it isnt you will cope. Just because something isnt p
5、erfect doesnt mean its worthless. And if your marriage ends in divorce, it doesnt define you as a failure. “Your own worth isnt dependent on the success of your marriage,“ says Joseph. Working at Relate, Christine Northam knows no marriage is perfect. “I dont know anybody who is 100% happy with thei
6、r marriage. Most marriages go through ups and downs. Youre idealizing it. You have a false impression of what real marriage is like. Most married people hate each other at times, frankly. You cant be perfectly in love all the time. “ So marriage is not the happy ending of the fairy-tales. I love the
7、 fact that, 44 years after they married, my parents still hold hands, make each other giggle, and tease each other. But they would doubtless balk at the idea that their marriage is perfect. Mum suffers from terrible vertigo, yet Dad persists in taking enormous detours every holiday through a mountai
8、n range. Dad could spend a week looking at a ruined church, whereas Mum could do the Acropolis in five minutes flat. Hundreds more took place along the recurring themes of what time to leave for the airport (Mum, six hours before a flight; Dad, six minutes) , how to pour a drink (Mum, fill a large g
9、lass to the brim; Dad, quarter-fill a thimble) and how best to pass leisure time (Mum, bulk-buying from catalogue companies; Dad, reading every column inch of the newspaper). They arent perfect. They just love each other enough to deal with the imperfections. As Cox says: “What they are good at is h
10、aving faith, loving each other and finding compromises to make them both happy. No one breezes through (marriage) without working at it. “ And yes, I would hope to have a marriage as successful as theirs. But I know it will take some work. Im ready for that. I finally got down on one knee this year.
11、 After waiting for the perfect romantic moment, I realized it would probably never come. I had prevaricated long enough. So I asked her on the spur of the moment, while I was unpacking the shopping from the car, with Wendy in a bath towel standing in our driveway asking why Id put Fred in the boot o
12、f the car (hed insisted) while he banged on the rear windscreen, pronouncing loudly about his latest fecal production. The proposal wasnt on a moonlit beach or over a candlelit dinner, but slap bang in the minutiae of everyday life, in all its hilarious, glorious ridiculousnessand because of the per
13、son she is, Wendy loved it. And so it is that I find myself marching towards my impending nuptials, eyes wide open, resolve secure, safe in the knowledge that I am punching well above my weight with the woman who will be my wife. Benjie and Wendy were married last Saturday. 1 Benjie Goodhart is afra
14、id of being married because_. （ A） his parents have a perfect marriage （ B） his parents hare a terrible marriage and have divorced （ C） he is afraid of a big change in his life （ D） he feels pressure of maintaining a perfect marriage 2 According to experts, why do people feel the pressure of having
15、a perfect marriage? （ A） Because people fear that their marriage will not be satisfactory. （ B） Because if a marriage ends in divorce, it means that they are a failure. （ C） Because they want to compete with others their happy marriage. （ D） All of them. 3 What does “balk“ mean in the third paragrap
16、h? （ A） accept （ B） refuse to comply （ C） suspect （ D） challenge 4 According to the last paragraph, all of the following statements are correct EXCEPT_. （ A） No marriage is perfect but they know how to deal with the imperfections. （ B） A happy marriage needs the great efforts from both parties. （ C）
17、 Only a few people have smooth marriage without efforts. （ D） A happy marriage needs the compromise from both parties. 5 The authors proposal of marriage can be described as_. （ A） romantic （ B） realistic （ C） plain （ D） exciting 5 New data released today from the Partnership for a Drug Free America
18、 suggest that not only are girls now drinking more than boys, they turn to drugs and alcohol for more serious reasons as well. The report, which analyzed results from the 2009 Partnership Attitude Tracking Study (PATS), a survey of teen attitudes and behaviors, shows that the number of middle-and hi
19、gh-school girls who say they drink has increased by 11 percent in the past year. Boys have stayed at about the same level, hovering around 52 percent. These numbers are more indicative of a long-term trend than a sudden uptick. In 2005 the rate of girls who had used alcohol in the past year as surve
20、yed by the partnership hit 57 percent, only to fall back to 55 percent in 2007 and 53 percent in 2008. (During that same time, boys continued to fall within a couple of percentage points of 50 percent, but the changes were not statistically significant. ) These arent the only data to note issues inv
21、olving girls and drinking. According to Monitoring the Future, an ongoing study that monitors the habits and attitudes of young Americans, the number of high-school students who admitted being drunk in the previous 30 days has changed dramatically for boys compared with girls. In 1998, 39 percent of
22、 boys reported being drunk in the previous 30 days, compared with 26. 6 percent of girls. Ten years later, in 2008, 29.2 percent of boys reported being drunk during the 30-day period, while girls stayed relatively steady at 26. 2 percent. “The numbers go down for boys and girls, but they go down muc
23、h more dramatically for boys,“ says Amelia Arria, director of the center on young adult health and development at the University of Maryland, School of Public Health. “It represents a 25 percent decrease for boys, but only a 1 percent decrease for girls. Girls are staying kind of level, and boys are
24、 dropping. “ For years, boys were the focus of underage-drinking interventions, but for the past decade, researchers have seen a close in the gender gap. Researchers speculate that more products devoted to making drinking easier and tastierthe sugar-laden beverages known as alco-popsare a factor. “T
25、heres a whole new raft of products that have come out in the last 10 to 12 years that were oriented to young females,“ says David Jerigan, executive director of the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth. “Alcohol now gets sold to girls as a functional food: it gets sold with calorie information, a d
26、rink of fitness, a drink with health benefits. “ But girls may be less concerned about their figure than they are about, well, everything else. The Partnership for a Drug Free America results also show that girls are more likely to associate drugs and alcohol with a way to avoid problems and relieve
27、 stress. (Boys, on the other hand, show dramatic increases in seeing drugs and alcohol as social lubricants: in 2009 compared with 2008, they were 16 percent more likely to see them as a way to make socializing easier, and 23 percent more likely to label drinking as a necessary ingredient for a part
28、y. ) Teen girls are more likely to be attuned to their feelings, says Leslie Walker, M. D. , director of adolescent medicine at Seattle Childrens Hospital, and therefore may seek alcohol as a way to self-medicate. “Girls tend to be more internalized with issues that are happening anyway. It makes se
29、nse that if they have some stress and things that they are dealing with, theyre going to take care of themselves instead of reaching out. “ Recent research on the adolescent brain has shown significant differences between males and females. Arria says, “Girls tend to be more sensitive to emotional s
30、tress, neurologically. Girls mature a little bit earlier in parts of the brain; boys develop later in those areas. “ That increased sensitivity, she says, combined with more relaxed attitudes and easier access to alcohol, may explain the difference in boys and girls when it comes to drinking. Its al
31、so possible that the more developed emotional brain allows girls to be more self-aware and honest about their motivations than boys. “I think early on, girls are more willing to admit negative emotions than boys,“ says Eric Wagner, professor at the Robert Stempel College of Public Health and Social
32、Work at Florida International University. “They might be drinking for the same reasons as boys, but boys are much less likely to admit those reasons. “ In his interventions with high-school students, says Wagner, kids are still very much drawn to traditional gender stereotypes, with boys associating
33、 drinking with a type of macho culture. The stress of figuring out gender roles, of doing well in school, and of the larger social and economic realities has led this generations teenagers to be more anxious than previous generations, says Walker. “Its a particularly stressful time for kids right no
34、w. Theyre seeing their parents stressed right now about the economy and jobs and thinking, what is there going to be for me?“ Adults, says Walker, often minimize the stress felt by their children, which can seem trivial compared with grown-up problemsafter all, kids dont have to worry about paying t
35、he mortgage. But to teenagers, that stress is very real, and the coping mechanisms they use to deal with that stress set a lifelong pattern. “Theyre learning the tools right then for what theyre going to use to handle adversity for the rest of their lives. “ And as more and more studies show the dan
36、ger of alcohol on developing brains, its important that the tools they use now wont damage them later. 6 Which of the following best indicates the main idea of the passage? （ A） Teen girls are drinking more than boys for different reasons. （ B） Measures should be taken to relieve the stress and worr
37、ies of teen girls. （ C） Teen girls are feeling more stress than boys. （ D） Teen girls are drinking mainly for fun. 7 We can learn from the third paragraph that_. （ A） more girls reported being drunk in the previous month than boys ten years ago （ B） more girls reported being drunk in the previous mo
38、nth than boys ten years later （ C） both girls and boys witness an increase in the drinking population in the past ten years （ D） boys witness a greater decrease in the drinking population than girls in the past ten years 8 Which of the following is NOT the reason for girls drinking? （ A） More alcoho
39、l is made oriented to young females. （ B） Girls drink to avoid problems and relieve stress. （ C） Girls regard drinking as a necessary ingredient for a party. （ D） Girls may seek alcohol as a way to self-medicate. 9 Girls stress comes from all the following EXCEPT_. （ A） displaying their gender roles
40、 （ B） peer competition at school （ C） paying the mortgage （ D） the economy and future jobs 10 The passage most probably appears in_. （ A） a scientific report （ B） a newspaper （ C） a textbook （ D） a brochure 10 Catastrophic volcanic eruptions in Europe may have culled Neanderthals to the point where
41、they couldnt bounce back, according to a controversial new theory. Modern humans, though, squeaked by, thanks to fallback populations in Africa and Asia, researchers say. About 40,000 years ago in what we now call Italy and the Caucasus Mountains, which straddle Europe and Asia, several volcanoes er
42、upted in quick succession, according to a new study to be published in the October issue of the journal Current Anthropology. Its likely the eruptions reduced or wiped out local bands of Neanderthals and indirectly affected farther-flung populations, the team concluded after analyzing pollen and ash
43、 from the affected area. The researchers examined sediments layer from around 40,000 years ago in Russias Mezmaiskaya Cave and found that the more volcanic ash a layer had, the less plant pollen it contained. “We tested all the layers for this volcanic ash signature. The most volcanic-ash-rich layer
44、“likely corresponding to the so-called Campanian Ignimbrite eruption, which occurred near Naples“had no (tree) pollen and very little pollen from other types of plants,“ said study team member Naomi Cleghorn. “Its just a sterile layer.“ The loss of plants would have led to a decline in plant-eating
45、mammals, which in turn would have affected the Neanderthals, who hunted large mammals for food. “This idea of an environmental cause for the Neanderthals demise has been out in the literature. What were trying to do is point out a specific mechanism,“ said Cleghorn, an anthropologist at the Universi
46、ty of Texas, Arlington. Other theories propose that modern humans played a vital role in the fall of the Neanderthals, either through competition, warfare, or interbreeding. If the volcanoes theory is correct, the Neanderthals end was much more tragic: dying slowly in a cold and desolate landscape b
47、ereft of food sources. “Its hard to say what it would have been like to be the last few groups out there, seeing other groups less and less over the years,“ Cleghorn said. The Neanderthals were a hardy species that lived through multiple ice ages and would have been familiar with volcanoes and other
48、 natural calamities. But the eruptions 40,000 years ago were unlike anything Neanderthals had faced before, Cleghorn and company say. For one thing, all the volcanoes apparently erupted around the same time. And one of those blasts, the Campanian Ignimbrite, is thought to have been the most powerful
49、 eruption in Europe in the last 200,000 years. “Its much easier to adapt to something thats happening over a couple of generations,“ Cleghorn said. “You can move around, you can find other places to live, and your population can rebound. “ “This is not that kind of event,“ she said, “This is unique. “ There may also have been small bands of Homo sapiens living in Europe at the time, Cleghorn said. They too would have been affected by the eruptions. But modern humans likely avoided extinction because the
